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“Fuck this,” I hissed. If whoever it was wanted to attack me, let them. I had a new blade to break in, and I’d pledged to carve out their eyeballs. I couldn’t do that if I was hiding inside, now could I?
No music for my run today. I needed all my senses keen and sharp. Just in case.
A small pang surprised me as the unconscious thought that I wished Grey was running with me crossed my mind.
I shook it away and started at a slow pace down the gravel drive, picking up speed as the gravity of the hill pulled me down its slope. Soon, the wind whipped through my hair, lifting sweat slicked strands and cooling the sweat beginning to coat my chest.
But still my runner’s high didn’t come and my mood soured, hating a nameless faceless person. Hating Mr. Unknown for ruining theonething I had that was mine.
In the distance, the sounds of the forest, my favorite sounds, became ominous things.
The snap of a twig could just as easily be a rabbit as it could be Mr. Unknown.
The rustle of leaves: a bird or a man?
It wasn’t fear, not exactly, it was the same self-preservationreadinessthat always took over when there was a threat. When my adrenaline knocked at the thresholds of my veins, waiting to be released.
Like the world had gone from low-fi to high-def in the blink of an eye. Vision sharper. My ears picking up even the tiniest sounds. I couldn’t enjoy the pounding of my feet on the earth or the sensation of flying as I soared over miles of woods and road. Not with this itching feeling scratching at the back of my skull.
“Fucking damnit,” I groaned to myself through pants, slowing to a jog as I veered off the road and into the trees toward the trailhead at the back of Briar Hall. If I stuck to the road, I’d have to go all the way around. This way I could cut through and save myself fifteen minutes. I’d have loved to have those fifteen minutes before, but now? What was the point?
I jumped over a low red-berry bush and onto the trail, seeing the lit opening in the trees ahead that would put me out at the back gardens of the Academy.
I saw him before he even moved. A dark shape lurking in the shade behind an old redwood. My feet dug into the ground as he rounded the tree, and I readied my new blade to throw, cursing myself for not arming myself with one of my own blades. My aim may not be perfect with this one yet. We hadn’t been properly acquainted. I held it up all the same, the dirt underfoot bunching under the sides of my sneakers as I slid to a stop.
“Whoa,” a familiar voice spoke, raising his hands to carefully peel back the hood of his dark windbreaker jacket, revealing his face.
“Officer Vick?”
“Put the knife down, girl.”
Hesitantly, I lowered it, but didn’t put it away or move any closer.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
He snorted derisively. “Do you know how hard it’s been to get to you? You’ve been with at least one of them every bloody hour of the day and night.”
My face pinched. “What do you want?”
“What doIwant? I thought we wanted the same thing...you haven’t called.”
“Because I didn’t have enough to give you yet.”
Officer Vick narrowed his eyes on me, stuffing his fists into his windbreaker pockets. “It’s true what I’ve heard then,” he said, a look of disgust twisting his features. “Youaretaking the trials. They’ve turned you, haven’t they?”
I frowned, a sneer curling my upper lip. “Never.”
He snorted and my face flushed hot, hands clenching.
“I didn’t ask for this,” I all but snapped. “It was the trials or death.”
He cocked his head at me, interested now. “You saw something, didn’t you? Something you shouldn’t have. Tell me. Tell me and this can all be over.”
My breath caught in my throat. The videos had been erased from my hard drive, but there was still a body. The body of a dead Ace in the ground out behind that old warehouse with one of Diesel’s bullets in his skull. Would the body be enough?
“Would you need testimony?”
Officer Vick’s hard look faltered, he hadn’t expected that question. “Depends on what sort of evidence you’ve got.”
